American Cinematographer - March 2010 - 8

Editor’s Note The setting of Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island is a foreboding psychiatric facility that makes The Shining’s Overlook Hotel look like fun for the whole family. Looming on a rocky, heavily guarded island off Boston Harbor, Ashecliffe Hospital is a penitentiary for the criminally insane. It’s a place that reminds U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) of the German concentration camp Dachau, which he helped liberate as a soldier during World War II. With the help of Robert Richardson, ASC, Scorsese uses this location to physically represent the movie’s nightmarish psychological landscape. In crafting a look for the vivid hallucinations Daniels begins to experience at Ashecliffe, the filmmakers drew inspiration from director/cinematographer George Stevens’ 16mm Kodachrome footage of the liberation of Dachau, material that Richardson describes as “hyper-real.” This style, as well as the film’s brooding “real-world” ambience, was achieved with custom look-up tables; the LUTs were combined with digital grading to augment the eerie images captured by Richardson and his crew, who also created the practical hurricane that pounds the asylum. “The lighting, color and texture all contribute to the blurring of reality and hallucination, raising the question of what is subjective vs. objective,” Richardson tells contributing writer Patricia Thomson (“Mind Games,” page 30). “Marty plays with this blurring of lines throughout the film, I think with great prowess. The film is a journey within one man’s mind, and what you see could be real or imagined.” Teleproduction is this month’s special focus, and we’ve spotlighted several projects you should add to your DVR’s playlist: HBO’s Band of Brothers sequel, The Pacific, which drafted cinematographers Remi Adefarasin, BSC and Steve Windon, ACS for hand-to-hand combat (page 46); Glee, an award-winning series that allows Christopher Baffa, ASC to help choreograph energetic musical interludes (page 52); CSI: NY, the hit forensic procedural that recently required cinematographers Marshall Adams and Feliks Parnell to transition from 35mm film to digital capture (page 58); and NY Export: Opus Jazz, a PBS ballet special shot and co-directed by Jody Lee Lipes that features choreography by the late Jerome Robbins (Production Slate, page 24). This issue also profiles a pair of ASC standouts who were honored at last month’s awards ceremony: John C. Flinn, who received the Society’s Career Achievement in Television Award (“A Passion for His Craft,” page 62), and Sol Negrin, whose long record of service was recognized with the Presidents Award (“Saluting an Industry Stalwart,” page 72). “I put everything I’ve got into every shot I do,” says Flinn, who has lent his talents to such memorable shows as Gunsmoke, Hawaii Five-O and Magnum, P.I. “When I’m on a series, I make 22 of the best movies I can per season.” Negrin has also made the most of his career, earning five Emmy nominations and then sharing his knowledge with new generations of students. “I worked on commercials, documentaries, industrial films and, eventually, feature films and television,” notes Negrin. “The best advice I was ever given came from [ASC cinematographer] Harry Stradling Sr., who said, ‘Never be afraid to take a chance. It may be the best thing you ever did.’” Stephen Pizzello Executive Editor Photo by Owen Roizman, ASC.
American Cinematographer - March 2010

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - March 2010
